


greenstick

by saltytangerine



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 1930s, Best Friends, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M, Pre-Captain America: The First Avenger, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Slash, Protective Steve Rogers, maybe? - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-22
Updated: 2019-04-22
Packaged: 2020-01-14 13:36:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18477310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltytangerine/pseuds/saltytangerine
Summary: Bucky decides he hates the cast. In the four nights he stays with them, he hates every second that he's in Steve's bed, paranoid that he'll knock him out with the mass of plaster he isn't sure will ever be sawn off his arm. Steve forgot about the arm on Wednesday and tried to grab Bucky's arm to pull it over his waist, only to let out a soft squeal at being crushed.





	greenstick

**Author's Note:**

> The incident wherein Bucky's arm is broken isn't explicitly described, nor will it be expanded on. Up to you on how you perceive it, especially because they're young in this-- 11/12.

_He won't remember why the voices were raised, not will he remember why he thought he could win this fight, but his arm felt like water was slowly being poured just under the surface of his skin. When the blow landed on his wrist, he instantly knew that something was broken, be it bone, cartilage or muscle. He doubled over, tucking his arm as close to his belly as he could and when he was able to swallow the nausea that came with the pain, he looked up so see a face that mirrored his own, full of fear and regret._

 

_“It was an accident, son.”_

 

Steve’s walk home is lonely without his friend. It seems so much longer than usual and he hasn’t taken this route alone all year. On a normal day, Bucky stuffs Steve's books into his own bag and slings over his shoulder, singing along to songs he made up in the winter of 1927 when the priest had been called in for Steve for the third time. They're miles apart on grades and Bucky will give him the answers to his homework if Steve promises to eat lunch with him to keep him busy and out of trouble. His apartment is on the second floor and the paint on the railings sloughs off in small sheets when he uses it to hold himself steady. Monday lessons only ever seem to bring English and Math and Steve can’t stand any of the teachers he’s had over the years. He comes up onto the landing and freezes— a figure sits on his doorstep and for a second he’s scared one of the bullies has followed him home and he's too exhausted to put up a fight. There’s only two options to who would be sitting there and instinctively, he calls out to the only person he wants it to be.

 

“Bucky?”

 

The figure nods, sat on the doorstep, his back against the door and his notebook open on his lap. He doesn’t look up at Steve and continues writing. Steve can’t see his left arm, it’s tucked under the book, but he notices the beads of sweat on his brow and his dark hair seems damp. The wind whips around him, threatening to blow him out off the landing and in to the road below, so he holds his coat tighter around himself with both hands.

 

“Buck, what are you doin’ out here?” Steve groans, leaning down and nudging his shoulder, pushing him to the side so he can reach the door handle, to find the door locked. His sweater is damp and Bucky hisses when he touches his shoulder.

 

“It’s loud at home and I got homework to finish, ‘sides, can’t I come see my friend?” He shrugs, as if his appearance, waiting for either Sarah or Steve to come home, is unexpected.

 

“Ain’t your ma gonna wonder where her twelve year old son is after sunset on a school night?” He says as he kicks the rock by the railing, revealing the key. No one turns the outside lights on; gas and electricity prices are the highest he's ever heard his mother complain about and with his poor eyesight, even he can see his friend needs to come inside.

 

“Nah.” His voice is strange, wet, and he won't tilt his head up to look at Steve. The step is wide enough for them both to have passage, so he slides over to the left.

 

“Do you wanna come in or sleep on the doorstep?” Steve steps in when Bucky leans to the side, leaving a space big enough for him to come through. “Ma’ll be in soon and I can heat up the leftovers.”

 

“I ain’t hungry, but yeah, I’ll come in.” He drops the pencil on the page and closes the book. He holds the book in his right hand and follows Steve into the kitchen. He likes the Rogers home, it’s small, but with only two people, it’s almost peaceful and he never struggles to breathe here. It’s the longest place that either of them have called home; only two blocks from his. The building faces east and through the small windows the sunrise shines in, flooding the kitchen with light; a beautiful wakeup call, no baby sisters screaming or dogs barking from next door. “I didn’t know you were out, I guessed you’d be back already.”

 

“You weren’t at school.” He says, almost bitterly at the fact that he was alone there; without him he doesn't care for having lunch with anyone else, nor does he have any of the limited self restraint that Bucky supplies him with. As long as they’ve been in the same school, Bucky has only been absent back when he caught measles at 8 years old and he hates being idle. He turns around and he’s about to continue mouthing off, but his eyes fall to the purple and yellow bruise that curls around Bucky’s left eye and the split on his lower lip. He feels sick when he turns the light on in the room and the sees distinct whiteness of a plaster cast covering his left forearm. It is an odd picture; James Buchanan Barnes roughed up, in place of Steven Rogers. He's used to seeing injuries on himself, bloodied knuckles and grazed knees. Last summer he broke the middle toe of his right foot while outrunning a group of boys; Bucky stopped as soon as he was down and carried him as he ran through the streets and up the fire escape to bring him home. “You—”

 

“It ain't nothing, you should see the other guy.” Bucky tries to smirk, but in smiling, he stretches the scab on his lip and he stops to dab at the bead of blood that forms there. His left eye is a little red and Steve wants to touch it, but he knows he needs something cold to put on the bruise and if his memory serves him well, he needs a warm place to stay while the adrenaline wears off.

 

“Anyone I know?” Steve is still staring when Bucky drops his notebook on the table and the pencil rolls out from between the pages, on to the floor. His mother keeps an ice pack in the back of the icebox for occasions such as this, where one of them would come home with a bruise that needs to come to life and bloom to relieve the pain. He wraps a clean dishcloth around the pack and tests the coldness on the back of his hand before going over and pressing it to the side of Bucky’s head. “Stop moving and let me hold it here.”

 

“Yeah but a fella never kisses and tells.” The couch is worn, but to Bucky, it feels like home. He rests his right arm along the back of the cushions, like usual, but he holds tenseness in his shoulders and his eyelids flutter imperceptibly when he hears the neighbors shouting. Still, he lets Steve touch him and the ice on his eyebrow and cheekbone is soothing and he shifts again when he sits by him. “I wanna take my shoes off, you can let go; I can still hold shit with this bust up hand.”

 

“Does it hurt?” Steve takes his hand back and he watches him as Bucky puts one foot on his other thigh and with his right hand, unties the laces of his boots. He grasps the heel and yanks them off, sending them clattering to the ground.

 

“Like a bitch.” He admits, eyes meeting Steve's for the first time.

 

“When?” He says with a scoff, finally dragging himself away to light the stove. He puts a few more pieces of coal in the bottom and pours out soup from bowl in the icebox into a clean saucepan. Coal dust clings to his hands and finds its way under his fingernails and his mother hates it. She arms him with a nailbrush and makes him scrub his fingers until they’re bright red and free from the black dust. She says it makes them look poorer than they are and it’s precisely the reason for his ice cold baths on a Sunday afternoon and a lukewarm one on a Wednesday. When they were younger, they shared baths, Bucky one end of the bath and Steve at the other, using the same bar of soap and Steve would let only Bucky wash his hair when he turned his back to him in the tub.

 

“Uhh, yesterday afternoon, I think, I haven't really slept much.” He says, running his hand over his face. Steve can see that he isn’t lying, if he excuses the bruises, he can see dark circles and Steve wants to hold the ice pack back over his left eye and let him lay down and rest.

 

“Who goes out beating kids on a Sunday night?” Steve sucks a droplet of soup off his thumb and takes his mother’s favorite spoon out of the cup and stirs the soup as it warms up on the stove. There’s a few pieces of ham still in the soup, a rarity in leftovers.

 

“I saw your ma at the hospital; I wanted her to patch me up but they said I couldn't choose my nurse.” He deflects, running his right hand over the arm of the couch, the tips of his fingers finding the bobbles where the fabric had been worn down over the years. His own home is full of furniture like this, secondhand, perhaps even thirdhand. He creates stories about each new piece of furniture they acquire; his favorite one to tell Steve is the tale of the grand dresser in his parents room and how it was used to store kittens before they were let loose in the tenements to find rats.

 

“She didn't tell me.”

 

“They got a secret code, ain't they; can't go gossiping about the most handsome patients.” Bucky tucks his legs up under himself on the couch and grabs his bag, pushing back the flap so he can rummage around. The pain in his wrist is sharp and although the cast stops him from moving much, he still feels twinges when he lifts his arm. The pain is lesser now than it was in the morning when the plaster was still damp, but it still burns and part of him feels ashamed for getting hurt in the first place.

 

“Or more likely, my ma don't work in emergency, Buck, she wouldn't come see you anyway.” He looks over his shoulder at Bucky sat in crumpled clothes, too big socks and his short trousers and he can't help himself. “You ain't really selling the handsome patient part now.”

 

“I'm disfigured, be kind to me, big guy.” He mumbles, pulling out a bar of chocolate from the bottom of his bag and sitting back triumphantly. The bright silver foil wrapper catches the light and the thought of eating the sickly sweet chocolate makes him feel nauseous. He looks up at Steve, spreading butter on a slice of bread and while they sit quietly, waiting for the soup to start bubbling, Bucky thinks that he wouldn’t mind living like this, when he’s older; sharing a home with his best friend. “He gave me this for bein’ quiet while they worked on me.”

 

“Are you staying the night?”

 

“If your ma says yes; my ma knows I'm here— catch.” He passes the bar to Steve and to their surprise, Steve catches it with both hands.

  


***

Bucky is nearly asleep and full of soup and bread and feeling fully protected by Steve when Sarah comes home. He hears the clicking of her shoes on the linoleum, but in a joint effort, they have already pulled out the couch cushions and he's laying on his right side, his casted arm heavy and awkward as he tries to get comfortable.

 

“Ma--” He hears Steve try to argue. Steve’s ears haven’t been good since the fever two winters ago and he sometimes forgets that other people can hear him loud and clear, but as he stands at the edge of the room, by the door with his mother, Bucky has to struggle to hear them talk.

 

“Move you boys to the bedroom, Steve.” She cuts him off and he can hear the sound of a kiss on a cheek or forehead. “Looks like he needs a bed rather than the floor.”

 

“He said you saw him.” His stomach turns at the concern in Steve's hushed voice and he screws his eyes shut tight.

 

“Did he tell you what happened?”

 

“Did he tell you?”

 

“Take him to bed, Stevie.” He hears her whisper, kind but stern, and if he opened his eyes, he was sure he would find her with a hand on her hip, uniform still as crisp as ever, commanding but gentle.

  
***

 

Bucky decides he hates the cast. In the four nights he stays with the Rogers, he hates every second that he's in Steve's bed; paranoid that he'll knock him out with the mass of plaster he isn't sure will ever be sawn off his arm. Steve forgot about the arm on Wednesday and tried to grab it to pull it over his waist, only to let out a soft squeal at being crushed.

 

“Does it still hurt?” Steve sits beside him on the low wall at the far end of the schoolyard. In the early morning, it had rained, soaking the streets and the end of the corridor where the sixth grade classrooms were; the ceiling is weak and two buckets gathered the drops that fall. The brick wall holds no dampness in it and as they sit, Steve on Bucky’s left, he runs his fingers over the cast. Sometimes, without warning, it gives off a soft cloud of plaster dust when touched, replacing the coal dust on his hands.

 

“Nah, stopped hurtin’ a day or so ago; now it’s just annoying me.” He hands over half his sandwich, to be met by Steve’s shaking of his head. Bucky lets out a huff of a laugh and rolls his eyes before putting the sandwich on his lap. “Eat it, I don’t like it without butter.”

 

“If you went home, you’d get sandwiches you want.” He points out, picking up the sandwich and turning it over in his hands. He doesn't want Bucky to ever leave his apartment; he now has a spare complete set of clothes for Bucky, pushed right to the back of his dresser and he has two pairs of socks of his, too. The routine set in quickly and Bucky always rises before Steve and he's always last to bed; he's always warm though and he never pushes Steve away when he comes in close with icy hands and feet.

 

“Yeah, I would.” He agrees and he lifts his left arm and shakes it, a candy bar falling out from the bottom.

 

“Is that your new magic trick?” Steve grins.

 

“It is until I get this shit off.”

  
  


 

Sarah doesn’t mind Bucky staying over, but on Friday, she tells him that he needs to go home as she kisses his forehead. He wants to argue, to ask if she could let him stay forever— his parents have other kids and they won’t miss him and he doesn’t want to go back to sharing a room with his sisters. He doesn’t have it in him to argue with her kind smile and quiet voice, so he agrees instead, and on Friday evening, he walks home, with the promise that he’ll meet Steve by the pier in the morning.

They’re similar; their hair is blond and their eyes are dark blue. He looks like his mother so much so that he can’t imagine what Mr Rogers ever looked like. Bucky sticks out like a sore thumb when he walks with them; his skin isn’t as pink as theirs and his hair is almost black in the wrong light and his eyes are lighter than Steve’s. He’s taller and wider, quicker on his feet and he has a single chickenpox scar to the right of his Adam’s apple.  

 

 

He eats breakfast with his family on Saturday and his mother dotes on him the entire time, kissing his cheek whenever she can and giving him the larger portions, joking that she has to buy her son away from Steve. He feels guilty and hugs her tight with his right arm after he finishes eating and takes the dishes from the table. His sisters chatter at the table and he never thought about how hard it would be to wash dishes with only one hand free. His mother squeezes his shoulders and gently guides him to the side and takes his place, singing as she cleans.

His apartment is below an old lady whose walking stick thunks on their ceiling day in and day out, adding to the chaos of six people living in two bedrooms. The constant noise makes his head hurt and as his youngest sister starts screaming, the noise stabbing right through him, his wrist starts to hurt again.

  


 

“You like my ma?” Steve walks along the edge of the pier, his boots heavy and keeping him upright. The water below is freezing and the current is strong; they both have heard stories about kids being dragged out into the wake of ships and being eaten by propellers and rudders.

 

“Yeah, I like her, she lets me stay over and she cooks a mean stew.” He shrugs and skips rocks over the water, watching them skim across the surface, once, twice, three times. Being near the water makes the wind wild and unpredictable, even in the height of summer. His birthday is at the start of spring and Steve’s is in the middle of the summer, and sometimes he wishes they were closer together so they could share birthdays as well as everything else. Last year, he asked for a new sketchpad for his birthday from his grandparents and saved it, still wrapped up in newspapers and gave it to Steve on his birthday four months later.

 

“Buck, I gotta know, and you don’t gotta be straight with me, I guess, but you gotta promise that you ain’t gonna deck me one or push me in the water either.”

 

Bucky raises an eyebrow and tosses his last stone in the water. “Are you ok, pal?”

 

“Do you _like_ my ma?” He hops off the edge of the pier onto the boardwalk and starts to walk back towards the shore. “You just were wantin’ her when you were in hospital and it got me thinking.”

 

“Well yeah.”

 

“No, Buck, I mean do you _like_ like her?” He isn't sure of himself and Bucky can tell and although he knows what he's asking, he still goes over and grabs his hand, his right hand taking Steve's smaller left and guides them between two small shacks at the start of the pier.  

 

“I'm too busy for girls, Stevie; your ma included.” His bruises have all but faded and his lower lip has healed and he almost looks like the Bucky that Steve remembers saying goodbye to last Saturday.

 

“Why'd you drag me down here?” He asks, noticing that Bucky’s hand still has a hold on his. Without meaning to he squeezes it, his thumb rubbing along the back of his palm.

 

“Promise me, Stevie, even when we find the time for girls, that we'll still be friends. That I'll still be dragging you away from bullies, even when we ain't wearing short trousers anymore.” His voice is more frantic than Steve ever remembers it sounding before, but he still nods, never yet finding something to disagree with Bucky Barnes on.

 

“Yeah, you sap, we'll still be friends, maybe I'll get to look after you sometimes.” Steve smiles and pats Bucky's left upper arm, instantly regretting it when he sees a flicker of discomfort flash across his face.

 

“You've done a pretty great job this last week...” He looks Steve straight in the eye and keeps hold of his left hand with his right. He likes Sarah, but she doesn't make him feel important, she doesn't tell him childish stories, and she doesn't need dragging away from dire situations once a week. He jokes about looking after Steve, but truth to be told, Steve is able to hold his own; Bucky just helps him refocus his efforts, stands in as his own compass and the companionship Steve offers in return is what Bucky really hangs around for. He pulls Steve in for a hug, his right arm right around him, wrapping right around Steve's smaller body, grasping his right shoulder. The hug lasts maybe too long to pass off as friendly, but Steve doesn't awkwardly pat Bucky's back as he stands with his chin hooked over his shoulder and instead, he holds him back with just as much sincerity. “I'm gonna drag you back home before the tide comes in and takes you away; I ain't bein’ left on this rock alone.”

 

He doesn't use his left arm to wrap around Steve, afraid of crushing him with the cast, and he doesn't turn his head or push him away when he feels Steve's lips against his cheek in a tight lipped peck. “You ain't dragging me around anywhere, one armed.” He says with a smile and Bucky knows that Mrs Rogers kisses everyone on the cheek on meeting or parting and it has probably rubbed off on her son, but he still feels his heart jump with the kiss. If it was up to him; he'd stay twelve and give up his left arm forever if it meant he could be looked after by Steve Rogers and his closed mouthed kisses.

  


**Author's Note:**

> I'm weak for pre-serum Steve, I'm also weak for Steve being the one that looks after Bucky, too.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Kudos are most welcome! Comments too! 
> 
> Find me on twitter: saltietangerine


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